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I’ve done this before

This blog is new, but blogs aren’t new to me. I grew up in front of a PC. I remember when I had timed sessions with the internet because each minute cost money! I actually miss using Google Reader (RIP) to keep track of my friends.

Through middle and high school, I used both AOL and ICQ to chat with friends after school and throughout the summers; it made living in the country a little bit easier.

In 1999, I joined Xanga and used the very public forum to write about whatever I wanted. I’m sure there’s some sort of permanent record out there about what 17-year-old me had to whine about, but I don’t even remember my user names!

Going off to college introduced me to LiveJournal and I met some of my life-long friends through this blogging platform. MySpace showed up and the flashy, glittery, auto-play of terrible “favorite” songs was introduced. I hated this. It was also during college, maybe sophomore year, actually, that I started using Facebook. My original Facebook account had a university email address — you needed that then!

I kept a very active blog on the Wedding Channel during my first marriage. I also met some amazing women who are still my friends through the platform available there. During this time, I started reading other blogs and seeing what the “professional” bloggers were doing.

Plurk was a short-lived, but massively far-reaching social network and micro-blogging site that I used regularly. I loved the quick pace and weird conversations I would have with people. I had multiple WordPress hosted blogs during this time, and changed my username about a million times. Thankfully, I’ve actually saved writing from this period in backup files and I do plan to skim it eventually.

I went from microblogging with Plurk to using Twitter as a sounding board for each and every idea I had.

“Tuna fish for lunch? Yay or nay?”

“I’m going on my first blind date, call the police in three hours if I haven’t Tweeted.” (I survived. I’m gonna marry the guy I Tweeted about.)

“Ten minutes until the pharmacy opens. Battery at 18%. Target has swimsuits. I’m all sorts of confused today.”

I’m a huge fan of Twitter, and am somewhat anxious about the expansion of its character limit. I don’t know that I will enjoy Twitter as much if my feed is full of 10,000 character Tweets; it won’t be the same. I do keep my Twitter private, as when I was a teacher, it was a very safe outlet for me.

I wrote professionally on blogs with 451 Press and WEGO Health for years during and immediately after my divorce. Writing about health-related topics while earning a public health education degree allowed me to see the skillful writing that caught attention of online readers. All this time, I still had my own personal blog — though it was never big, or famous — and I was still meeting amazing writers from all across the country.

In March of 2010, I was invited to be a beta user for Pinterest. I fell in love with the website and still have my original account. (I have since made a second, more up-to-date account.) I even have an old old email from Ben Silbermann with his personal phone number I received shortly after Pinterest started.

My love of photography solidified my interest in Instagram and I am a regular “this is my dinner” and “look at the back of my silly kid’s head” photo-sharer. If you’re interested in seeing life with a pre-schooler, please feel free to follow my Instagram account Sarrup11.

I’ve used both Blogger and Tumblr in the past as platforms to share thoughts, but ultimately always come back to WordPress. Selectively sharing my life with the outside world via the internet is not new to me, though my techniques and level of comfort with what I share has changed.

This blog is a glimpse into my life; this blog isn’t my whole life. I live offline and I make no promises as to what I will or won’t share. I am aware of the permanent public record most of the internet doesn’t talk about. I know my digital footprint is wide.